Failure after long perseverance is much grander than never to have a striving good enough to be called a failure.

Striving for something worth failing at

There's something quietly radical in this idea, especially in a world that treats failure like a contagious disease. We're trained to avoid it at all costs—to play it safe, stay in lanes we know we can handle, treat any stumble as evidence we chose wrong. But Eliot is pointing to something deeper: that real failure is actually a sign you tried something worth trying. You didn't dabble. You didn't give up at the first sign of resistance.

Think about the person who spends twenty years building a business that ultimately collapses, versus someone who never starts one at all. Yes, the first person failed. But they also learned, risked, pushed themselves into uncomfortable territory. The second person remains comfortable and intact—but they never actually strived for anything. Eliot's saying that's a smaller existence, not a safer one. There's a particular kind of courage that comes from persevering long enough to truly fail, because it means you believed something enough to make real sacrifices for it.

The twist is that this doesn't require spectacular outcomes. It's not about failure being noble because success will eventually follow. It's noble because it proves you were genuinely engaged with your life, not just going through motions. That matters, regardless of what happens next.